The Emerald gave little attention to Wednesday’s Senate meeting. In fact, my absence from the meeting would have created a larger headline, but that’s not the point. The principles of democracy, debate and free speech were the point of this year’s final Senate meeting and somehow the Emerald missed the significance (“Walkout ends Senate talk on cartoons,” ODE, May 25).
As most individuals familiar with campus politics know, I (Dallas Brown) proposed a resolution regarding The Insurgent’s March publication (the one depicting Christ on the cover), to be debated at the meeting. The resolution itself was not a sound document, and although I wrote it in the spirit of my unchanging argument, the legal aspects that were most important were underrepresented.
What most individuals do not realize and now will never know is that what was intended to be presented Wednesday night was an argument that challenges the common perspective of freedom of speech and viewpoint neutrality. Fellow senator and law student Wally Hicks prepared an interpretation of the Supreme Court decision Southworth v. Regents of the University of Wisconsin, which he intended to read. The document makes significant arguments regarding a question that ultimately encompasses the entire purpose of student government.
Hicks and I planned to debate the fundamental question that underlies the entire Insurgent debate: Does the Student Senate have jurisdiction to review whether a group’s funded behavior follows the guidelines of the fee and the written mandates of their organization? And if not, are there checks and balances, besides the original review process, to ensure that a group continues to contribute to campus and provide a service as defined by the Greentape Notebook? The ability to present these arguments to the Senate was stifled from the beginning and culminated with senators leaving the meeting unadjourned before the topic could even be discussed. The walkout was organized and lobbied for by members of next year’s ASUO Executive, particularly President Jared Axelrod and his Chief of Staff Ashley Rees, as well as retiring Programs Administrator David Goward. Some senators claimed they were pressured into it, “that their careers were on the line,” and others left in what they thought was a clever display of protest.
If I correctly recall, the individuals who left the debate were Senators Monica Irvin, Kristin Kato, Mike Filippelli, Mat Foust (whom I was most surprised by), Richard Malena, Athan Papailiou, Sara Hamilton and Senate President Stephanie Erickson. Goward announced the protest by claiming the Senate’s right to debate free speech was inherently illegal. The nature of their protest is remarkable. By inhibiting the free speech of the presenting senators, the protesting senators claim they’re protecting free speech. The ultimate irony is that all but one of the dissenting senators approved of the agenda (my discussion item included), defending the right for us to present. Somewhere among the many recesses throughout the night, these senators were influenced to walk out of the meeting without even giving an excuse for their departure. I am ashamed of my colleagues for being so confident in what they believe to be right as to not listen to the arguments of others. To limit someone’s ability to speak is the most abhorrent of all human endeavors. As my term expires, I can reflect on all that I have learned in my service as a student senator, and what I have concluded as most apparent is the lack of principles that my colleagues represent and the hypocrisy in which they justify their actions. Such is the nature of the declining values of public service.
Dallas Brown is a former student senator at the University.